Blank Stars
by MegElemental
Summary: 'What's happened' the Doctor asked, his face suddenly serious. 'What have I missed'A friend. A funeral.'


**Serious spoilers for the end of Torchwood: Miracle Day. Other than that, just plain angst and sorrow, so don't expect a cheery read.**

It was the highest building in Cardiff. The wind really ripped around it, sending his coat whipping out behind him.

He didn't even know why he had chosen that particular place to stand. To stand and wait. It wasn't as if HQ was still nestled underneath the ground, humming with activity and people. Perhaps he had wanted to make a point. It didn't really feel like the point to make anymore. There were more important things to talk about.

Maybe it was to emphasize his immortality. He needed reminding, after that brief stint of being mortal. He'd forgotten how it felt to be so _vulnerable, _so _breakable. _Perhaps _he _needed reminding too.

The view was beautiful and heartbreakingly familiar. He felt a soft smile curve his lips, but it faded as soon as he heard the whine and groan of the engines behind him.

_He came. _

The engines stilled, that final thunk that shook the vortex and rippled through Jack's bones. He held his breath, and waited. The door creaked open, and faint voices reached him through the relentless howl of the wind.

'What are we doing on top of a building?' a girl's voice asked. Scottish inflections.

'In _Cardiff_?' This time it was a man. But it wasn't _him._

'It's… important.'

The voices stopped; Jack guessed they had spotted him standing right on the very edge, his coat flapping like a flag.

'Err… should he be doing that?' the man asked, his voice full of worry and concern.

'Just… shhh. Stay there,' the Doctor ordered.

Footsteps drew closer, and Jack let a small, bitter smile quirk the edges of his lips even though the Doctor wouldn't be able to see it.

'I didn't think you would come.'

A pause. A breath.

'Course I came,' he said, his voice overly bright and cheerful. 'If I get a message from one of my old friends I always come, you know that.'

'We don't need you anymore,' Jack said, still facing the bay, still keeping his back to the Doctor. He knew it was rude, but he felt he was entitled to a little rudeness.

_After what he has done._

'Where have you been, Doctor?' he asked, before the Doctor could speak again. 'What have you been doing?' The levity slipped from his voice as he turned to the Doctor and treated him to the full force of his bitter smile. 'Only I think I deserve to know what kept you away from the world when we needed you more than ever before.'

The Doctor's forehead crinkled; he took a hesitant step forward.

'What happened?'

'The Blessing happened,' Jack's face seemed to have locked into that bitter smile, a sarcastic replication of rigor mortis.

'What?' He was confused. Wrong-footed. Unsure. Jack seized on the emotions like a predator.

'The Blessing happened,' he said, his words spitting with venom. 'People were being _burnt alive _and the only people around to help were the remnants of Torchwood, and we lost _Esther._ And _you _weren't there.'

Realisation seemed to dawn on the Doctor's face; the girl behind him left the door of the TARDIS and stepped forward towards him, shooting a look at Jack. It was almost… possessive.

'What happened, Doctor?' she asked. 'What did we miss?'

'What were you doing?' Jack asked again.

'He was looking for our daughter,' the girl said defensively, linking arms with the other man and pulling him forwards, despite his obvious reluctance.

'You take _families _on the TARDIS now, Doctor. I thought you 'didn't do domestic'?'

'Jack, this is Amy, Rory. Amy, Rory, this is Jack,' the Doctor said distantly, his forehead still wrinkled.

'_Captain _Jack _Harkness_,' he enunciated clearly. 'And I would normally say it was a pleasure to meet you, but that's not what I'm here for.'

'The Blessing…' the Doctor muttered. 'But that was never supposed to be a big thing… I thought it cleared itself up…'

'_No. _We cleared it up. And we lost Esther Drummond. And you don't even know who she is.' Jack could feel the anger rising, and struggled to press it down. 'Tell me, Doctor, do you even care about us at all? Do you even give a damn anymore, or do you just flit around in the TARDIS and pretend nothing else exists? Because we had to save ourselves even though you promised to protect the Earth. You demoted Harriet Jones for setting up precautions and you said you would always be there. _But you weren't. _You aren't even there for your old friends any more.'

'What's happened?' the Doctor asked, his face suddenly serious. 'What have I missed?'

'A friend. A funeral.' Jack turned and began to walk past the Doctor, past the TARDIS and the couple, towards the door to the staircase. The Doctor grasped his arm roughly as he passed, his eyes burning with some of the fervour Jack remembered.

_Too little, too late._

'_Who?' _he asked, his voice low and dangerous.

'I can't believe you even have to ask,' Jack said, disgusted with the alien who held his arm so tightly, as he looked into the Doctor's eyes and saw nothing he recognised.

'I SAID _WHO?' _The Doctor bellowed, his eyes flashing. Amy and Rory took a step back, frightened by the vehemence of the shout.

Jack shrugged him off.

'Sarah Jane Smith,' he said, and his voice cracked slightly. 'You missed her funeral. It was last Thursday.'

The Doctor's face crumpled; Jack stalked off. His voice caught up with him, low and quiet.

'I'm so-'

'_Don't _you say _anything,' _Jack whirled around, anger radiating from him like heat. '_Don't _you say _anything _about her.'

'But I-'

'You weren't there, Doctor. You were off gallivanting around the universe and you forgot about us. You forgot about the Earth and its people. You forgot about your friends. You think you're some new man, a new face, a new life, and you think you can just _forget? _Just like _that?'_

The Doctor looked smaller and younger and frailer under the weight of Jack's anger than Jack had ever seen him before. Jack felt smug, victorious, at having pushed the Time Lord down to size.

'I look at you, Doctor, and I don't even know you,' he said, quieter now, but his words still burning with anger. 'I think that even if you have come to save us, I would have wanted the northern man with the leather jacket and the ridiculously silly ears and ridiculously large grin who swapped my gun with a banana and danced with Rose. Or the floppy –haired, skinny man with the long coat and sad old eyes who loved us all. I wouldn't have wanted _you._'

'Jack.' The Doctor looked hurt. 'When I regenerate, I change _everything. _Personality, looks-'

'Last time you were still basically the same person, underneath it all. Now you're… it's like you're trying to hard to be you.' Jack was frustrated with his lack of coherence, and ran his fingers through his wind-tousled hair. 'If the old Doctors who travelled with Sarah Jane were still there, somewhere, they _would have gone to her funeral.'_

The Doctor looked stunned, and stepped away from his naked anger. Amy advanced towards Jack, looking rather put off.

'The Doctor _has _been saving the world,' she said hotly. 'I suppose you know about the Silence? Or the pandorica? He's stopped all those things from killing us all. He's done things people on Earth can't even imagine, and you-'

'Been there, done that, got the T-shirt,' Jack said, brushing off her annoyance as though she were nothing more than a pesky fly. 'I used to travel with the Doctor. I was there when an old companion of his saved the world, far into the future, from a Dalek army, by absorbing the heart of the TARDIS. She brought me back to life and now I _can't die._ I then watched him face off one of his greatest enemies with the help of us all, again and again, in a year you can't even _remember_. So _don't _tell _me _that I can't imagine what he's done, because I've _seen _it, I've _lived _it, and now I can't _die _because of it.'

'I said I was sorry about that.' The Doctor's voice was stifled, as though he had caught a cold. He walked towards Jack, his eyes sad and tired and full of remorse.

'I won't say I'm sorry-'

'_Good.'_

'-but I am. And I… I didn't know about Sarah Jane. Is Luke…?'

'Martha and Mickey are looking after him, when he's not at Oxford. It _destroyed_ him. When you look at him, you forget he's only four years old.'

'I should have been there.'

'_Yes. _You _should._'

'I'll make it up,' he said, but it fell flat as soon as the words left his mouth. Jack turned away.

'I have nothing else to say.'

And he left.

'What was _that? _Who was _he?'_

Just as the Doctor feared, Rory and Amy were full of questions when they re-entered the TARDIS.

'An old friend. Someone I let down.' He stared at the console and felt the years settle on him like snow. He wondered, briefly, if his old selves still lived in his brain, watching his life from behind his eyes. He hoped not. He'd made a bit of a mess of everything.

'And… Sarah Jane?' Amy asked softly. To his horror, a tear escaped and slipped down his cheek, splashing onto the console.

'Amy…' Rory began, but she ignored her husband and pressed on.

'Why can't you just go back in time to her funeral? This _is _a time machine, after all.'

'I _can't. _I forgot- it would be disrespecting her by going back and changing things. Like she was a … a second thought. A quick detour. She was more than that.'

Rory succeeded in pulling his wife away, and left the Doctor and his sorrows alone in the control room, alone to think and _hurt._

He made his decision- his hands made the TARDIS creak and clunk and whirr and then… silence. He wandered into the depths of the TARDIS, pulled something old out of a worn, dusty box, and then stepped outside into the graveyard.

The cold stone was nothing like the Sarah Jane he remembered. Only the inscription was right- _Beloved mother and friend. She saved the world with her courage._

The sight of his old friend, reduced to a stone and a few words, broke his strength. His knees bucked, and hit the grassy floor hard, sending a jolt through his body. He took a deep breath, bit back tears, and spoke.

'I'm so sorry.'

It didn't take long to wrap the long scarf around the gravestone, but he stretched it out, deliberated every movement, his concentration the only thing stopping the pain and anger and grief.

He rocked back onto his heels, surveyed his handiwork, and then broke down.

Once the tears began, they didn't stop. He cried for Sarah Jane, for Luke, Gallifrey, his people, everyone he had known and loved and lost, for the past.

And then he stood up, tear-trails luminescent on his cheeks, and walked into the future.

**AN: Well, I have no idea where **_**that **_**one came from. I think I just thoroughly depressed myself. Before anyone flames, I don't hate the new Doctor or Rory or Amy. The end of Torchwood just left me in a funny mood. And I needed to write a tribute for Elisabeth Sladen. I think her character deserves it.**

**At least it's out of my system. I hope you enjoyed. Please drop me a line if you did… or even if you didn't.**

**Meg**


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